“I never before understood or appreciated the spiritual depth within the story of Ruth. Now I look forward to this 30-minute class each afternoon! Thank you, Rabbi Smason!” – an anonymous participant

NHBZ Zooms

Sisterhood is grateful to Rabbi Smason for providing daily classes, Words of Torah, insight, inspiration, and comfort during this time.

Recognizing Sisterhood’s Life Members

Since formally organizing in 1949, NHBZ’s Sisterhood has provided much support for our Shul – the Sunday Torah School, kitchen equipment, major appliances, landscaping, gifts for Bar and Bat Mitzvah kids, school supplies and the Chanukah toy drive – as well as hundreds of holiday dinners and programs. The Sisterhood began sponsoring the Federation’s Passport to Israel Program in 1988, raising thousands of dollars for NHBZ children to visit Israel. NHBZ women cooked in the kitchen, prepared meals, visited the sick, produced the famous annual NHBZ Picnic, and worked countless hours – out of dedication for the Shul, respect for each other, and a love of Yiddishkeit. Many of the women took on leadership responsibilities. And many became Life Members to demonstrate their financial support as well as their devotion to the Sisterhood they built.

Learning to Take the Good from the Bad

In answering a question from a reader about how to deal with a bad situation, Sara Esther Crispe (writing as ‘Dear Rachel Week by Week’ for Chabad’s TheJewishWoman.org) reminds us that when the situation isn’t changing, what is left to change is you and how you view your situation. She writes about a Shabbat law that she hopes is helpful…“the concept that on Shabbatit is forbidden to do borer. Borer is the act of separating, in which you remove the bad from the good. An example would be that you can’t pick out a rotten tomato from your salad and throw it out. Now does that mean you are supposed to eat the rotten tomato? Absolutely not. So what are you allowed to do? The rotten tomato has to stay where it is, but you can take all the “good” from the “bad.” So you can either eat around the rotten tomato, or you can separate all the rest of the salad away from what is rotten.

“Now the difference between the two is very subtle, yet very profound, and is a life lesson for so many situations. Often, when we don’t like something, or there is something “bad” in a situation, we focus our energy on trying to get rid of it. But the Torah is teaching us that really it is not the way to handle it. We shouldn’t be exerting our energy trying to change something or someone else, but rather, our energy should be focused on what we can handle and change ourselves. Leave the rotten tomato where it is. Don’t eat it. Don’t even touch it. But take out everything else from around it, take everything that is good, and focus on that.”

If you often find yourself only seeing the negative… “start focusing on all the things you like, all the things that are positive, and you will notice that not only do they outweigh the things that you are not happy with, but you will therefore not be focused on what you don’t like.”

“Ultimately, the specifics are not the issue – the attitude is. We cannot change others, but we can change ourselves and our perspective. You now have a great opportunity to work on this. Put into practice the lesson Shabbat teaches us about the concept of borer and how one may not take the bad from the good. Rather, our job is to take the good from the bad!”

For information or to join Sisterhood, call the NHBZ office at 314-991-2100, ext. 3, or email: sisterhood@nhbz.org